Twitter Drops ‘Stars’ For ‘Hearts’ and ‘Favorites’ For ‘Likes’

Twitter recently announced that they would replace their users’ ability to mark “favorites” with an option to “like” Tweets instead. Along with this, they have also decided to ditch the star icon for favorites with a heart icon for likes.

The social media networking company made a statement regarding this change, saying that because “the star could be confusing, especially to newcomers”, they will now use a more “universal symbol” like the heart “that resonates across languages, cultures, and time zones.”

According to user tests, these changes have been said to do well and will soon be introduced on Vine too. However, as it happens with all new changes, this one, too, has had mixed reactions, since the “favourites” option was used to indicate various things and was even used as a bookmark or reminder.

I work at @twitter but even I can’t believe how we replaced a completely value-neutral term like “favorite” with something so loaded.

Social media is getting more emotive, and its users are becoming more and more aware of small things such as “like” buttons and its correct usages. Facebook is working on ways to let users express a lot more than simple “likes”, whereas Twitter seems to be going back a step by providing its users a basic “like” option. With all the revamping and the firing of employees, let us hope that Twitter can manage to stay afloat and save their dwindling fan base. What do you think about this? Let us know in the comments section below.